Well, I've always joked that it was channeled to me. [Be]cause it was very easy. But it was after talking, just talking with people. That's what people told me. So I wrote it down. You know, I organized, wrote it down. It was really given to me by the people. And that's why I've always said it's for anybody's public use. It's not mine. I don't own that. So, there's no great story behind it, other than this is what people were sharing with me, with their stories when I go to mixed family groups, or conferences, or just talking with people individually. It all came out of that. I didn't make a single piece of that up myself.

Moving beyond the oppositionsânationalism versus assimilation, men versus women, Texans versus Californiansâthat have characterized much of Chicano studies, Mestizaje synthesizes and assesses twenty-five years of pathbreaking thinking to make a case for the core components, sensibilities, and concerns of the discipline.